Canadian composer Jean Coulthard (1908-2000) was a woman who determinedly followed her own musical path, creating an impressive body of work which, though attracting international recognition during her lifetime, is rarely heard today outside her native country.

Coulthard produced around 350 works in her very long career, for many years fitting composing around her job as a university lecturer and the responsibilities of family life. She was fortunate in having a musical mother whose passion for the French Impressionist composers rubbed off on her daughter, as is is clearly evident in her earlier works. Donald Macleod introduces a selection of works in which echoes of that distinctive soundworld can be heard, including a lament inspired by the chorale theme from a Bach cantata, and a piano concerto in the grand tradition of Beethoven and Schumann.

The Bird of Dawning Singeth All Night Long
Campbell Trowsdale, violin
CBC Vancouver Orchestra
Mario Bernardi, Conductor

Threnody
Réa Beaumont, piano

Concerto for Piano and Orchestra
Robert Silverman, piano
CBC Vancouver Orchestra
Dwight Bennet, Conductor

Four Irish Songs (orchestrated by Michael Conway Baker)
Linda Maguire, mezzo soprano
CBC Vancouver Orchestra
Mario Bernardi, Conductor. Show less